Return of the Revenge of the Son of Saying Hi to Josiah!

[MidnightRose]

Stay safe, Josiah. Thoughts and prayers are with you and with everyone in Japan, especially those affected. Hope all goes well with the nuclear reactors.

[Josiah]

Hi! Yeah, while most of Japan is ok some of the Northeastern coastal towns were practically wiped out. I put a link in today's PV news post / travelogue entry with a link for those who want to donate to the relief efforts (I already did).

As for the nuclear plants... Some are under control, Fukushima is still a bit iffy but most experts agree that the chances of it turning into a full scale meltdown and contaminating a large area are high unlikely. Though it'll probably be a few days before they can definately call it safe so it'll be keeping people on edge for a while. But as someone who spent most of yesterday (and a decent amount of time today) following the news, I can say that way to many anti-nuclear groups and news agencies are playing it up to support their cause. As Shauni said, they're ignoring the all the devestation caused by the tsunami. Plus, they're fear mongering. I've seen a number of articles calling this the new Chernobyle despite the fact that it's still contained and most experts agree that even a worst case scenario wouldn't be anywhere near that bad. FYI: The Fukushima incident has been rated a 4 by the Interactional Atomic Agency whatever. Three Mile Island (which pretty much turned out ok) was a 5 and Chernobyle a 7. But if you just read some of the news headlines, you'd think that the reactors had exploded and half of Japan was irradiated. Ugh...

Anyway, it's late and I've got work tomorrow so I really should get to sleep. Game posts will have to wait...

[shauni]

I was reading a news paper before that has a VERY bad reputation for sensationalism (I wanted free theme park tokens it is giving away, wouldn't touch the bloody thing otherwise) that was really playing up the nuclear POTENTIAL incident much worse than the ACTUAL disaster that DID ACTUALLY level cities and kill 1000's. I guess Nuclear fallout sells more papers than tsunamis... horrendous.

I will note however the headline was actually a nice on. A 60 year old man was rescued 10 miles out to sea after spending two days on his roof. I hope there are a few more blessings over the next few days like that. The rescue teams need some hope of recovering more people like him instead of...well, you know what I mean...

God bless those poor souls...

[Puyon]

Greetings! Happy Pi Day, and Happy White Day!

While a lot of people in America are concerned about Japan, a group of kids in my science class can care less, and do care less. As a matter of fact, while I was explaining to my friend about all the gloomy doomy stuff that was going on, one of the kids confronted us, and said we shouldn't care, as long as no Americans were involved, and none of destruction could ever reach the East Coast, so it really doesn't matter what happened there. I'm not sure what was on that kid's mind, "I had no idea people we're born without hearts. And I am a people." Was what my friend said when the other kid left.

[BionicleMandi121]

...Oh yeah, it's White Day...

Konnichiwa. Glad to hear you're alright, Josiah. I've been so busy with art stuff that I haven't logged on here in a while and I actually managed to forget you were over in Japan. @_@ /fail
I have been reading the newspapers almost every morning now (a rare activity for me). My art teacher was also watching recorded footage of when the tsunami hit, on Saturday. It...looks bad. Really bad. :/
My mom's getting worried about one of her college friends living in Japan and was talking about trying to call her while I was eating breakfast. We'll probably also start getting involved with our local Tzu Chi branch to see what we can do to help. Some of the stories in the papers about the Japanese conserving electricity were rather heartwarming.

In other news, I found a video on YouTube yesterday of my art teacher, painting. Dunno why that feels so significant. The video itself isn't the best quality, whoever had the camera kept moving around, and it has less than 700 views, but I think it's the first time I saw a video of someone I personally know, filmed by a stranger who saw him at work and thought it was so spectacular it was worth filming and uploading to YouTube. ._.
I've also been EV training my team in SoulSilver in my spare time. First time ever EV training anything. It's not as bad as I thought it would be. /o/

[Metalheadz]

Poor Japanese... It's really sad to hear 1,000 bodies were seen washed up.

Anywho, today I'm rather in a good mood and feel like being nice to people. After all the crazy crap and a really good friend of mine suddenly through with me, I think I've found ways to move on and do better. No homework, got a B in AP World History and A in Pre-AP English. Life can't get any better today. My only hope is I can get over her and move on, as well as my Japanese friend and Josiah being alright.

Peace out!

[Josiah]

Hi! Last I saw the official death count for the tsunami was around 2,400 and the estimate was 6,000 or more... I'm still doing ok though the train line I usually take to work is having electrical problems so I had to go this long round-about way and barely made it in time. I found a better alternate route for tomorrow though it still takes considerably longer and costs more. And they're not sure when the trains will be entirely back on schedule. But yeah, if that's the worst I have to deal with I shouldn't complain.

On the bright side, all the problamatic nuclear reactors except those at Fukushima 1 have been brought completely under control. On the down side, it seems like just about every time they've got a handle on Fukushima 1 something else goes wrong... While I know I'm probably safe here no matter what happens (and a worst case scenario is highly unlikely), I can't say that I'm not a bit nervous. Things were looking a lot more normal today though in terms of the number of people out and the number of places open.

On a much lighter note, despite a lot of stores being closed I did find some cool stuff at Akihabara yesterday, the best being a Chrono Cross figurine. CC is one of my favorite games of all time but I didn't think it had gotten a figurine set. Must be pretty rare since this is the first time I've seen one. Fortunately, it wasn't very expensive. Now if I could just find the rest...

[shauni]

Glad to hear you are doing okay. People I talk to about it are saying the death toll has been over 10,000 people. I guess things get exaggerated, but 6,000 is still a horrible loss of life...
Are your parents still going to fly out to see you or have you cancelled the trip?

[Josiah]

Hi! Officially it's around 2,500. Estiamtes have ranged from 6,000 - 10,000 though last I heard only around 3,500 people are still missing which would put the max at 6,000.

My parents' trip was on somewhat shaky ground since the quake due to the blackouts and iffy train schedule. The whole nuclear plant mess made it even worse. There was a brief spike in radiation levels this morning due to a fire (which was quickly put out), which culimnated in some very minute radiation readings in Tokyo. By minute I mean this. They were significantly higher than normal ambiet levels but even so you'd have to be standing outside for around 2 1/2 days straight to get as much radiation as you would from a chest x-ray. So not really dangerous in the least. And the levels dropped to 1/10 of that (just a touch above normal) within a few hours. Though, of course, you wouldn't know that by reading half the new stories... But anyway, while I managed to calm my dad down somewhat after explaining the numbers (a couple hours ago he really wanted me on the first flight back to the US), he's worried that it could happen again at much higher levels (unlikely but not impossible at this point). So my parents' trip is off though, if they do successfully cool off the reactors without any serious nuclear fallout, they'll likely be willing to give it another shot later in the year (summer or fall) if our schedules are open.

Because of that, and to make my dad happy, I moved my departure flight up several days as well. When I first came to Japan I had a return flight set for the 30th (since I didn't have my work visa yet). I was going to move it to mid-April (the end of my parents' trip) assuming I hadn't decided to stay in Japan on a more long term basis. Now, however, I moved it to the 25th (the day after I finish my current job). I hate to do it but I can't say that I'm not a little worried as well (though I think that, one way or another, the Fukushima situation will likely be resolved by the end of the week) and it makes my dad feel a lot better. Plus, with the blackouts and inconsistant train schedules in Tokyo set to continue on into April, any serious touring would be difficult unless I went to fairly far off area. I already had to cancel my plans for this coming weekend since the train line I'd need to take is shut down.

I think that, were my parents to come in two weeks as scheduled, we could still do our trip pretty much as planned but I can't argue that, with the way things are now, it really isn't the best time. Assuming the reactors don't go critical, I suspect the parts of Japan not hit by the tsunami will be mostly back to normal in a week or so and totally back to normal in several weeks or a month (whenever they turn most of the undamaged power plants back on). Some of those towns up North though could take quite a long time to recover. It's all pretty dissapointing (lousy way to end what has otherwise been a great trip) but what are you gonna do? And, as I said before, if this is the worst it affects me, I really shouldn't complain.

[MidnightRose]

I just saw a news blurb saying that a magnitude 6.0 earthquake had hit eastern Japan. Hope all is well and that this doesn't affect you, Josiah!

[Puyon]

Stupid Tectonic Plates should just stop building up so much tension. *grumble grumble*

Greetings. The only really interest thing that happened to me today was a science investigation.
Though it was depressing.
We were examining protists, and I had a Paramecium sample. They are pretty small for Protists, and Amoebas eat anything smaller than them. While I was looking through my microscope, I found no Paramecium. Only a Large Amoeba. *sad face* All the other sample were disappointments as well. That's all I have to say. I have homework to get to, and a room to clean.

[shauni]

And the Media has remembered the civil war in Libya. It has been headline news up until last Friday when the tsunami hit and then not a word while the media cover Japan. God, I know that Japan should be the headline story, but they could have at least kept everyone updated on Libya as well. They have a 24 hour news channel.

The hype about the radiation in Tokyo has been big news everywhere..and I kinda think its a little justified this time. I wouldn't like the idea that I was being radiated. I know you said the levels are really low, but how long will the radiation be around in the area?

[Kaida]

Greetings.

I've been having some lappy problems the last couple days, but their all fixed now. ^_^

Also been tired, I've kind of been keeping up with the news, I'm kind of over the whole doom and gloom thing. It's depressing and terrible whats happening in Japan and pretty much everywhere else in the world.
And all the news stations are blowing the whole nuclear thing way out of proportion here as well as everywhere else by the sounds of it. It's worry and bad but they make it sound like its 100 times worse then what it actually is. We presnetly don't have and Nuclear Plants in Aussie, but it's started up the whole debate of why we shouldn't have it and etc etc. Some people are acting like they had already started building a plant somewhere.

But anyways I have foods to make, wheeeeeeeeee. *goes off to make dinner*

[Josiah]

Hi! Yeah, I'm staying out of the nuclear debate now. Yeah this is bad, but it's generally pretty safe and gives a lot of power for a low cost and a small amount of space. Coal and oil fumes aren't exactly good for your health either...

Anyway, the radiation spike in Tokyo didn't last long. After four hours levels were down to just barely above normal. They're still having a lot of problems at the Fukushima plant though. While there's still a fairly good chance they'll get things under control and, even if they don't, since this is a completely different type of reactor than Chernobyle, any widespread damage even in the worst case should be fairly minor and sort lived. I, however, and returning to the US tomorrow. While I am worried, my parents are far more worried then I am and after numerous phone calls they found me a spot on a plane leaving tomorrow so... I have very mixed feelings about the whole thing. There's a lot more details on PV and I'll no doubt be talking about it even more in Friday's update when I'll likely have more time and a clearer head. For now though, I've got a ton of things to do to get ready. Don't expect to see my online again until Thursday night or sometime Friday.

[shauni]

Hi Josiah.

I'm sorry to hear you had to cut your trip short, but I'm also re leaved you are getting away from the area. i know the chances of anything really bad happening are low, but I'd hate it if anything happened to you.